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North Wells Street Historic District

Cook County, Illinois Registered Historic Place stubsHistoric districts in ChicagoItalianate architecture in IllinoisNational Register of Historic Places in ChicagoQueen Anne architecture in Illinois
1244 N Wells
1244 N Wells

The North Wells Street Historic District is a commercial historic district located on the west side of the 1200 block of North Wells Street in the Near North Side neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. The district consists of seven buildings: four stores, two factories, and a firehouse. Built from 1871 to 1888, the buildings are an unusually intact block of what was once a much larger commercial district on the Near North Side. The four stores include a two-story frame storefront building, one of only six remaining from the post-Chicago Fire period in the city, and three three- or three-and-a-half-story store and flat buildings. The factories include a three-story loft and a two-story building that resembles the storefronts. The firehouse, known as Engine Company No. 27, is the second-oldest in the city.The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 3, 1984.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article North Wells Street Historic District (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

North Wells Street Historic District
North Wells Street, Chicago Near North Side

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Latitude Longitude
N 41.905555555556 ° E -87.634722222222 °
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North Wells Street 1256-1260
60614 Chicago, Near North Side
Illinois, United States
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1244 N Wells
1244 N Wells
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LaSalle Towers Apartments

LaSalle Towers Apartments is a high-rise apartment complex in the Near North Side neighborhood of Chicago. The building is located at 1211 North LaSalle Street, which is the corner of LaSalle and Division Street. In the 1960s (possibly prior & afterwards) it was named the Tuscony Apartment Hotel. Mostly small apartments with two rooms of approx 8 ft wide (1-window each) by 10 ft long and a small bath room approx 6 x 7 ft and a small window between the two rooms. A short connecting corridor of approx 3 x 6 ft. One room had a kitchenette and the other was a setting/sleeping room. This is from my observation whilst looking for an apartment in 1965. The high-rise was built in 1929 and was originally used as a hotel. It was renovated in the early 1980s by Weese, Seegers, Hickey, Weese and converted into an apartment complex. During the renovation, the exterior of the building was covered on three sides with trompe-l'œil murals by Richard Haas. On the east face, the mural creates the illusion that the structure contains Chicago School bay windows and a cornice with a circular window. On the south face, Haas evokes two Louis Sullivan creations: the Golden Arch from the World's Columbian Exposition Transportation Building, and the circular window of the Merchants' National Bank in Grinnell, Iowa. Beneath the arch, Sullivan, Daniel Burnham, John Wellborn Root, and Frank Lloyd Wright stand together. A "reflection" of the Chicago Board of Trade Building also appears in the painted windows between these two features. On the north face, another set of painted windows contain a fake reflection of Adolf Loos' unused design for the Tribune Tower, which Loos had envisioned as a large column-like structure. Collectively, the murals are called Homage to the Chicago School of Architecture.